During the off-season, media outlets come up with creative ways to fill the void. There are some fun exercises and large-scale projects based around what-ifs. Well, Bleacher Report released a hypothesis while brainstorming what the NFL would look like after the expansion draft. Let’s take a look at what the Minnesota Vikings roster would look like if that happened.
The first step in the expansion draft is to protect the players on each team’s roster; those who are not protected are also eligible. Here are the players who will be entering the draft:
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The following are the proposed rules:
An expansion team would need to acquire 30 players or a contract worth $114,456 (38% of the 2002 salary cap). In 2002, the Texans recruited 19 players, but they reached the financial threshold by committing $41.6 million (58% of the cap) to those 19 players.
This seems like a good balance since the expansion team will also be paying draft fees and can do their own individual work on the open market.
In this exercise, we’ll go a step further, but aim to cap this fictional team at 65% of the 2026 cap, which is about $195 million.
While the possibility of joining the NFL is still far away, it would certainly be an interesting try to see what might happen.
This article originally appeared on Vikings Wire: NFL offseason: What happens with Vikings in expansion draft?
